The American Bankers Association this week voiced support for new rules by the Federal Communications Commission that would combat illegal calls. The draft order, which is scheduled for a vote by the FCC on Feb. 27, would require all voice service providers in the call pathway to block calls that are highly likely to be illegal based on a “reasonable do-not-originate” list. Current FCC rules require only “gateway” providers — those accepting call traffic from abroad — to block calls based on a reasonable DNO list.
“Over the past two years, ABA — joined by other trade associations — has sounded the alarm regarding criminals impersonating banks by illegally ‘spoofing’ bank phone numbers,” the association said in a letter. “ABA remains committed to stopping criminals who seek to defraud consumers, but our members and we cannot achieve this goal alone.”
ABA also expressed support for the provision in the draft order that would require voice service providers exclusively to use “SIP Code 603+” to communicate to the caller that its call was blocked in the network based on analytics. Voice service providers currently use a separate SIP Code— unenhanced SIP Code 603 — for this purpose, even though that code could signal network-level blocking or that the recipient declined the call.
